


Our Love Is Pastured (Such A Mournful Sound)

by joidianne4eva



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon Fix-It, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-24
Packaged: 2018-05-18 19:08:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5939926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joidianne4eva/pseuds/joidianne4eva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story had a beginning and an end. Two points that would always stand out to people looking in from the outside, but the really important bits were usually what came in between. </p><p>Chris didn't figure that out until his story was almost over and like almost everything else in his life, he had Josh to blame for that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be a long one. Posting will be every other Sunday.

The operative didn’t usually get assigned these types of jobs and as he stood still, watching the target, he remembered why.

His speciality was elimination not containment but he’d been hired to do a job and he always did what he was paid to do.

The target was hunched over a corpse, ripping into it with a mixture of human teeth and the needle like fangs that wendigos sported.

The operative had been watching it for twenty minutes already and all it had done was eat.

Finally the target dropped the gnawed skull in its hands before shuffling to the other side of the room and the operative followed, pausing whenever the target glanced his way.

The target stopped in front of a pile of wood, rocking itself as it crooned softly.

Finally it chuffed and started digging into the pile until it found whatever it was looking for and this time it clicked low in its throat as it began to haul its prize towards it.

The wood gave way, leaving the target clutching the body of another wendigo and the operative barely managed to stifle a sigh because of course the thing would be looking for more to eat.

That was when the target did something unexpected.

Instead of eating, it moved it hands over the other wendigo’s face, crooning again and as the sound rose into a wail that finally broke on a shriek of anger, the operative could almost believe the target was…crying.

The thought was all he needed to raise his gun and the target turned towards him but not fast enough.

Three darts embedded themselves in the target’s chest and it only managed one last shriek before it slumped forward.

The operative raised his hand to his headset as he stared at the way the target had managed to curl itself around the other wendigo as if it had been trying to protect it.

His headset squawked recapturing his attention and the operative straightened.

“Eagle two to base, target has been tagged and is ready for transfer,” he reported.

“Copy that eagle two,” his colleague responded and the operative switched the headset off.

He hoped that the Washington’s cure actually worked because the thing in front of him was more than just a wendigo, he could feel it in his bones.

 

*O*

Chris clenched his shaking fingers together and slid them between his knees as he watched the scenery fly past.

He hadn’t told any of the others about what the Washingtons had told him because he knew that they wouldn’t understand.

They’d all tried to put what had happened up on the mountain behind them but Chris didn’t have that luxury. He’d lost too much to even think about forgetting not when he couldn’t stop dreaming about Josh screaming his name while he was ripped apart by those _things._

There was no forgetting for Chris, not when he’d failed Josh. He’d failed to notice that his best friend was off his meds, then he’d failed to realize that Josh wasn’t coping as well as he’d pretended and how fucking stupid had he been to think that Josh would’ve gotten over his sisters’ deaths in a year?

His therapist had told him that guilt was normal in situations like these, where you survived when someone else didn’t but Chris hadn’t survived…hadn’t walked away from that mountain whole and when the Washingtons had rung him, their voices hushed and scared, it’d felt like Chris had taken his first breath since that night.

The car slowed and Chris’ heart started to thunder in his chest as the large grey building loomed in front of him.

Bile clawed at his throat but it didn’t keep him from reaching for the handle of the door.

His shaking legs didn’t stop him stepping out into the dim sunlight.

He’d left Josh behind once, he’d be damned if he’d do it again.

*O*

It was hot inside the building, heat swamping Chris until he was forced to shed his jacket as he waited in the lobby as his driver had instructed him to do. He wondered if it was just a coincidence or if it was because wendigos were cold…cold because they were barely alive, a traitorous part of his mind whispered but Chris squashed the voice before it could really get started.

Josh wasn’t a wendigo, his parents had said that…he was just…he was sick, that was it. He was sick and they were going to get him cured.

Josh wasn’t one of those things. Josh could never be one of those things.

The mantra spun around Chris’ head as he waited in the sweltering heat.

The door that the driver had vanished through opened and Chris’ lips quirked into a woobly smile at the sight of Josh’s mom.

She looked both smaller and older than Chris had remembered. The thought made something curdle in Chris’ chest as he realized that he hadn’t seen her since before Hannah and Beth…that he hadn’t even tried to see her after they…after Josh.

The bright, ever present, smile that she’d passed down to her three children was a broken, fragile thing and Chris’ fingers twisted his coat as fought the urge to hug her but she took the decision out of his hands as she stepped forward and pulled him into her embrace.

Chris tried to bite back the sob trying to slither from his throat but at the familiar smell of her perfume and the feeling of her gentle fingers in his hair, he couldn’t help himself because it was his fault, if he hadn’t been drinking with Josh, if he’d seen the signs after Beth and Hannah they wouldn’t be here.

“It’s okay, I never blamed you. None of us did,” she whispered and Chris didn’t even realize that he’d been babbling until she spoke and her words just made the tears flow faster until he was all out sobbing, folding himself into her embrace like he’d done countless times over the years.

“I’m sorry,” Chris sniffled as he pulled away and she let him though the look in her eyes said that she hadn’t wanted to.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for and Josh will tell you the same thing…” her eyes flickered away from his face as she spoke. “…as soon as he’s able to, he’ll tell you that blaming yourself is foolish. You didn’t play that trick on my girls and you didn’t know what Josh had been doing. You can’t blame yourself for any of it, do you understand me?”

Chris nodded because there wasn’t a thing he could say to that. He didn’t really believe her words and he knew that she wasn’t stupid enough to think that he did but he didn’t refute them either and that seemed good enough for her.

“But you’re not here to see me,” she teased and Chris found himself nodding. “Okay,” she breathed, glancing away. “I just want you to remember that he’s still sick so…just don’t go in there with any expectations. The cure takes time but we’ve got the best people working on it,” she assured him and Chris could hear the hesitance in her tone.

“I want to see him,” he whispered and she inhaled slowly.

“Alright, just…follow me,” she responded. “And Chris…thank you…for wanting to be here.”

“Nowhere else I’d rather be,” Chris muttered, flushing under her stare because it was the truth. He was meant to be by Josh’s side, no matter what.


	2. A Window Full Of Starving Eyes

The room that Josh’s mom led him to was about as large as the lobby that they’d left behind. One length of wall was nothing but a window and Chris paused in front of it but whatever was on the other side was hidden in the pitch black darkness.

“The lights don’t activate until he’s awake. We’re trying to break his nocturnal habits,” an unfamiliar voice said and Chris turned around to find an elderly woman watching him shrewdly.

“And the light…it doesn’t hurt him, right?” Chris found himself asking because the stranger had been adamant about the wendigos dislike of light.

The woman blinked slowly before turning towards Josh’s mother, whose lips were twisted in a frown.

“We’d never hurt him, not if we can help it,” she explained but Chris’ mind latched onto what she wasn’t saying. That if they couldn’t help it, they would hurt Josh.

“Whatever hurts the wendigo will hurt your friend but the only way to cleanse his body of the spirit is to either make it want to leave or give it no choice,” The other woman explained, the jewellery on her wrists rattling as she gesticulated. “An exorcism would have been more effective if he was completely taken over but as it is, he appears to be fighting against it, which has left us with a very small selection of tools to use.”

Chris’ brows furrowed at that because all he was hearing was excuses and not a single part of that grand explanation sounded like the woman actually knew how to make Josh better. “I’m sorry but, who are you?”

“Dr Williams is an expert…especially when it comes to these things,” Josh’s mom cut in and the woman…the doctor smiled.

“It helps when you grow up caught between Native American Folklore and the Obeah practices of my mother’s ancestors,” she chuckled. “I won’t sugar-coat the truth and I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty, that’s why I was hired for this job.”

“But you _can_ cure him, right?” Chris queried and Dr Williams inclined her head.

“Possessions are my speciality but there is never a guarantee with these things. The longer the spirit has existed in the world of the living the less likely that it will go without a fight and sometimes it takes its host with it when it goes.”

Josh’s mom made a small sound at that and before Chris could comfort her, she fled the room.

“The truth is…” the good doctor continued, her gaze flickering only once to the door where the other woman had fled, “…that there is no certainty in matter such as these. There’s no miracle cure that will bring Mr Washington back to you and if we do succeed in expelling the spirit, there is no guarantee that it won’t leave a taint.”

“A taint?”

Chris couldn’t help the whisper even if it made him sound like an idiot because the thought of Josh being damaged because they hadn’t gone back, because _he_ hadn’t gone back was enough to make him feel faint.

Dr Williams hummed beneath her breath as she turned away from Chris and moved to the single table that occupied the space.

She gestured for him to come closer and when Chris obeyed, he regretted it the second that his gaze settled on the pictures strewn across the metal surface.

The people staring back at him were emaciated, bodies riddled with scars and bruises but what caught Chris’ attention was the blank look in their eyes. They looked like zombies; like they weren’t fully alive…their eyes were the eyes of the wendigos.

“A taint,” Dr Williams confirmed, her fingers brushing over the pictures, almost absentmindedly. “The horror that precedes the creation of a wendigo, that soul tearing hunger would be enough to break any human mind but picture that _and_ the knowledge of just what they’d done to survive. Eating the flesh of those they loved, hunting them down like they were little more than animals. Tearing them apart and savouring their screams without an ounce of pity,” she paused here to glance at Chris, “Even after the spirit leaves, these memories along with traces of that hunger may still remain and as you can see,” she gestured to the pictures, “…very few have the strength to overcome an experience as horrifying as that. We can free their bodies of the spirit but only they can free their minds.”

Chris swallowed as he curled his arms around his waist, mustering up a smile that felt as shaky as his heartbeat. “Josh can do it,” he told the woman. “He’s the strongest person I know.”

Dr Williams’ brows hiked at that, “Let’s hope you’re right about that,” she responded lightly and Chris could hear the scepticism in her tone but he didn’t let it bother him…or he tried not to because Josh had to get better. He was going to get better and Chris was going to stay by his side every step of the way.

Thought in mind he nodded to himself before turning back to the doctor, who was watching him with shrewd eyes.

“Could you…” he paused trying to shape the words, “I’m going to help, anything you need me to do, I’ll do it but I can’t help if I don’t know what’s wrong and I know what’s wrong but I don’t know what those things really were. I knew their names but I couldn’t make myself look them up and I…”

“You want to learn more about the wendigo spirit?” The doctor guessed and Chris nodded.

The woman smiled, “Perfect.”

Chris couldn’t return her smile but the fact that she seemed willing to help him was enough.

*O*

Chis read everything Dr Williams gave him. It wasn’t much more than what they’d found out on their own but she’d also pointed him in the direction of several sites that weren’t full of crap, that Chris had promised to look up as soon as he got home.

Josh’s mom had collected him several hours later, apparently the less people around at night the less likely that Josh would act up and just the phrase sent a shiver down Chris’ spine because he’d seen the wendigo version of acting up. It was something he could live without seeing ever again.

The sites were informative at best and downright horrifying at worst.

There were various theories that tried to explain the existence of the wendigo spirit, with people seeing them as everything from avengers to protectors.

Some people even worshipped them.

Chris had scoffed at that one because the wendigos he’d run into hadn’t been trying to protect a damn thing and as far as he was concerned anybody who worshipped those things deserved whatever they got.

He read until he couldn’t read anymore, until the words on the screen blurred and the shadows at the corners of his vision lengthened like skeletal fingers reaching for him out of the darkness.

Chris didn’t know when he fell asleep but his dreams were plagued with the shrieks of the wendigos hunting him and his heart pounded as he stood stock still because if he didn’t move they couldn’t see him and if they couldn’t see him, he was safe.

He woke with Josh’s name on his lips and a scream that wasn’t his own, ringing in his ears.

Just like he had every night since they’d left the mountain.

*O*

Dr Williams looked almost surprised to see him and Chris didn’t know how to feel about that.

The woman didn’t give him the chance to overthink it either.

“It’s just the two of us and my staff here today. Your friend’s parents decided to stay away,” she told him and Chris frowned even as he stared at the dark window.

He wanted to know why they could just decide to not turn up but he wasn’t sure if he had the right to ask. Not after everything that they’d lost…that they could still lose.

“Can I see Josh soon?” he queried instead, glancing at the doctor.

Dr Williams cocked her head, amber eyes flickering over Chris’ face for a long moment but she must have seen whatever she was looking for because she nodded.

“We’ll be turning the lights on in two hours. He was up most of the night but the plan is to keep him awake long enough during the day so that the procedure tonight will be easier.”

“What procedure?” Chris demanded.

Dr Williams blinked slowly, “The procedure designed to free your friend of the spirit,” she responded slowly like Chris was the stupid one and her words did make him feel foolish because they obviously weren’t keeping Josh locked up for the fun of it.

“Oh,” Chris whispered, turning away to face the window again. “Will it hurt him?” he couldn’t help but ask and the doctor’s silence was answer enough.

Chris pressed his hand against the glass, “He probably wouldn’t care, you know? If it hurt, I mean. He always acted…acts, he always acts so fucking tough like nothing gets to him and we all started to believe it but it was just an act. I should’ve known that because how the fuck do your forgive the people who probably got your sisters killed? If they hadn’t played that stupid prank and the worst part is they never said sorry, never said it might have been their faults. They acted like nothing had happened because he did…that’s why…”

“Did you know that Josh was born on those mountains?”

The words had Chris’ head snapping around, “What?”

Dr Williams nodded at the window, “His mother said that was why they bought it in the first place. It was special to them because that was where he came into the world,” she explained, a small smile curling the edge of her lips. “The wendigo taints whatever it touches but something like that, his birthplace being the place where the spirit was bound, that leaves a mark of a different kind as well.”

Chris exhaled slowly, “The sites you told me about, some of them thought the wendigos are meant to be protectors.”

Dr Williams rolled her shoulders at that, “It’s been a long time since the wendigos were anything but monsters but I guess they could be right. Maybe they once were protectors.”

“Maybe,” Chris agreed. Maybe they had been but they weren’t now. Now they were monsters and Chris was sure that that was the only thing they could ever be.

*O*

Chris barely knew what to do with himself as he waited but Dr Williams put him to work almost immediately.

She had him scanning her notes for anything she’d missed and the more Chris read, the less he wanted to know.

It was one thing to see this shit playing out on the big screen or to read a script that Josh had stolen from his dad’s stash so they could get a sneak peak of what his next movie would be like but reading it now was different. The people Chris was reading about were real people. They’d suffered, were still suffering and so many of them had been lost.

The thought that Josh could one day be one of these people, a footnote in the doctor’s portfolio, made Chris feel sick but he didn’t stop reading until Dr Williams laid a hand on his shoulder, startling him out of the trance that he’d fallen into.

“It’s time,” she told him and Chris swallowed past the lump in his throat. “Are you ready?”

“No,” Chris answered, honesty startled out of him but he held her gaze. “But I’m still doing this.”

The doctor narrowed her eyes before nodding once, “Fine, come with me.”

Chris scrambled after her as she approached the window, eyeing the woman in confusion as she nodded at nothing Chris could see but a second later the room was flooded with light and Chris screamed as something collided with the glass.

He stumbled backwards, tripping over his own feet and landing on his ass but his eyes never left the window where what was left of his best friend was watching him with mismatched eyes.

“Josh,” Chris whispered and the thing… _Josh_ , cocked his head like he could hear Chris.

A second later Josh narrowed his eyes and opened his mouth.

“Josh,” he echoed…in Chris’ voice.


End file.
